Supernova Simulations and Strategies For the Dark Energy Survey

We present an analysis of supernova light curves simulated for the upcoming Dark Energy Survey (DES) supernova search. The simulations employ a code suite that generates and fits realistic light curves in order to obtain distance modulus/redshift pairs that are passed to a cosmology fitter. We investigated several different survey strategies including field selection, supernova selection biases, and photometric redshift measurements. Using the results of this study, we chose a 30 square degree search area in the griz filter set. We forecast 1) that this survey will provide a homogeneous sample of up to 4000 Type Ia supernovae in the redshift range 0.05<z<1.2, and 2) that the increased red efficiency of the DES camera will significantly improve high-redshift color measurements. The redshift of each supernova with an identified host galaxy will be obtained from spectroscopic observations of the host. A supernova spectrum will be obtained for a subset of the sample, which will be utilized for control studies. In addition, we have investigated the use of combined photometric redshifts taking into account data from both the host and supernova. We have investigated and estimated the likely contamination from core-collapse supernovae based on photometric identification, and have found that a Type Ia supernova sample purity of up to 98% is obtainable given specific assumptions. Furthermore, we present systematic uncertainties due to sample purity, photometric calibration, dust extinction priors, filter-centroid shifts, and inter-calibration. We conclude by estimating the uncertainty on the cosmological parameters that will be measured from the DES supernova data. Subject headings: supernovae – cosmology: simulations Argonne National Laboratory, 9700 South Cass Avenue, Lemont, IL 60439, USA Kavli Institute for Cosmological Physics, The University of Chicago, 5640 South Ellis Avenue Chicago, IL 60637, USA Department of Astronomy and Astrophysics, The University of Chicago, 5640 South Ellis Avenue Chicago, IL 60637, USA E. O. Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, 1 Cyclotron Rd., Berkeley, CA 94720, USA Department of Physics, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, 1110 West Green Street, Urbana, IL 61801-3080 USA Institute of Cosmology and Gravitation, University of Portsmouth, Dennis Sciama Building, Burnaby Road, Portsmouth PO1 3FX, UK Center for Particle Astrophysics, Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory, P.O. Box 500, Batavia, IL 60510, USA Centre for Astrophysics, Science & Technology Research Institute, University of Hertfordshire, Hatfield, Herts, AL10 9AB, UK Physics Department, University of the Western Cape, Cape Town, 7535, South Africa Department of Physics and Astronomy, Pevensey 2 Building University of Sussex, Falmer Brighton BN1 9QH, UK Now at: Instituto de F́ısica, Universidade Federal do Rio de Janeiro C. P. 68528, CEP 21941-972, Rio de Janeiro, RJ, Brazil Department of Physics and Astronomy, University of